...we tend to grow.
Grow Local Colorado is a group of volunteers dedicated to promoting local food, local community, and local economy.
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Thanks to Our Community... We Tend to Grow
Hello fellow gardeners,
Well, we’ve sown our last cover crop to feed and blanket the soil and put our 20 garden sites to bed. We have much respect and thanks for the land, the plants and you the people, who showed up and interacted with our gardens to create nourishment for those affected by food/nutrition insecurity. We hope your time out there provided some education, expressed your care for community, provided some solace and beauty. We hope that your efforts in the gardens have helped open your minds to the issues and needs facing us all. So, we will rest soon, but we have just one more project in the Barnum neighborhood. This will be another sheet mulching event to build life and health in the soil.
Well, we’ve sown our last cover crop to feed and blanket the soil and put our 20 garden sites to bed. We have much respect and thanks for the land, the plants and you the people, who showed up and interacted with our gardens to create nourishment for those affected by food/nutrition insecurity. We hope your time out there provided some education, expressed your care for community, provided some solace and beauty. We hope that your efforts in the gardens have helped open your minds to the issues and needs facing us all. So, we will rest soon, but we have just one more project in the Barnum neighborhood. This will be another sheet mulching event to build life and health in the soil.
ACTION:
Speaking of showing up. as you know, we don’t do anything alone. And show up you did! All 1,300 of you volunteers spent a collective 3,113 hours out there tending the gardens. Of course, we couldn’t have done this without the additional help of our returned garden leader Holly and our three new interns. In total we grew and shared 9,882 pounds of produce and gleaned 3,100 pounds of fruit. Our gleaning takes place at peak harvest time, so kudos to all of you who came out to shake the trees after gardening. Literally! And finally, this year we completely satisfied our needs for garlic seed and shared an additional 80 bulbs with our friends over at Ekar Farm.
Speaking of showing up. as you know, we don’t do anything alone. And show up you did! All 1,300 of you volunteers spent a collective 3,113 hours out there tending the gardens. Of course, we couldn’t have done this without the additional help of our returned garden leader Holly and our three new interns. In total we grew and shared 9,882 pounds of produce and gleaned 3,100 pounds of fruit. Our gleaning takes place at peak harvest time, so kudos to all of you who came out to shake the trees after gardening. Literally! And finally, this year we completely satisfied our needs for garlic seed and shared an additional 80 bulbs with our friends over at Ekar Farm.
RELATIONSHIPS:
New relationships were formed with Denver Community Fridges, We Don’t Waste, and we deepened the one with the Civic Center Conservancy. This brings our partnering organizations to 21 (compared to 4 when we began in 2009). You can begin to see how we accomplish so much for such a small organization run by volunteers. Let’s take a look at each of them. Our friends at Denver Community Fridges are a mutual aid organization operating several free refrigerators all over Denver. Anyone with a need for food, or has an offering of food, can visit them. Together we placed over 400 pounds of freshly harvested produce in those fridges. We Don’t Waste helped to transport large harvests straight from the garden to over 12 of their food relief partners. Civic Center Conservancy provided additional volunteers through their SPARKLES park events. With their help we increased our harvest total there by 500 pounds. This wasn’t a function of planting more; it was about the people.
New relationships were formed with Denver Community Fridges, We Don’t Waste, and we deepened the one with the Civic Center Conservancy. This brings our partnering organizations to 21 (compared to 4 when we began in 2009). You can begin to see how we accomplish so much for such a small organization run by volunteers. Let’s take a look at each of them. Our friends at Denver Community Fridges are a mutual aid organization operating several free refrigerators all over Denver. Anyone with a need for food, or has an offering of food, can visit them. Together we placed over 400 pounds of freshly harvested produce in those fridges. We Don’t Waste helped to transport large harvests straight from the garden to over 12 of their food relief partners. Civic Center Conservancy provided additional volunteers through their SPARKLES park events. With their help we increased our harvest total there by 500 pounds. This wasn’t a function of planting more; it was about the people.
ACCESS:
Thanks to our seed donors for helping us to hold our 3rd Annual Earth Day Seed Giveaway in collaboration with Ekar Farm, The Table Urban Farm and Slow Food Denver. We distributed seed packets from 3 different locations around Denver. It was well attended. We plan to continue sourcing seeds to share each year. On the subject of seeds, our project hosted by Metro Caring, the Denver Local Seed Project, is in its second year of existence. We currently have 300+ packets of seeds, have grown our stock from 24 to 49 varieties and collected from 9 zip codes thus far. With people returning more seed this year than last! This locally adapted seed is key to preserving plant diversity and accessible local seed. We will continue to grow and share this supply more widely, educate others on seed saving and partner to build a resilient seed cache.
Thanks to our seed donors for helping us to hold our 3rd Annual Earth Day Seed Giveaway in collaboration with Ekar Farm, The Table Urban Farm and Slow Food Denver. We distributed seed packets from 3 different locations around Denver. It was well attended. We plan to continue sourcing seeds to share each year. On the subject of seeds, our project hosted by Metro Caring, the Denver Local Seed Project, is in its second year of existence. We currently have 300+ packets of seeds, have grown our stock from 24 to 49 varieties and collected from 9 zip codes thus far. With people returning more seed this year than last! This locally adapted seed is key to preserving plant diversity and accessible local seed. We will continue to grow and share this supply more widely, educate others on seed saving and partner to build a resilient seed cache.
EFFECTIVE TOOLS:
This year thanks to the e bike rebate program, we acquired an e bike. A hoop house was donated to our PEER garden site. Our bike is aptly dubbed the Harvest Hauler. Being able to transport our harvests via bike is another way we can do our part for the health of our air. We can also appreciate the additional benefits like stronger legs and the pedal assist! The hoop house is a huge opportunity to develop skills in coping with extreme weather patterns, by growing inside all year long.
So thank you Denver!
Thanks for showing you care with every moment you took to be in the gardens. We feel they're a place to be hopeful and a place to act. Until next season. Keep your food local, keep advocating for the planet and each other. By the way, consider grabbing a CSA for next summer to support your local farmers.
With love from the garden,
Barbara & Linda
Co Directors
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